© Karel Hemerijckx
Earlier this week, influencer and actor Nicolas Caeyers was sentenced to one year in prison for raping a minor. Today one of his victims responded to Het Laatste Nieuws about what the mild conviction means for him.
“He took my virginity at a time when I was still looking for my identity and orientation,” the victim tells HLN about what happened at the time. According to the young man, who is 23 years old today and testifies anonymously, the verdict sends the wrong signal.
Caeyers received a one-year suspended prison sentence for the rape and sexual assault of two minor boys and the sexual assault of a third minor. There were extenuating circumstances: Caeyers sought help himself, has no criminal records and the facts date from ten years ago.
However, the victim filed a complaint with the intention that perpetrators do not think that they can just get away with anything. “I hate to read that he is not a pedophile. This really sends the wrong signal to victims and abusers,” he said.
Earlier this week, the mother of the then 13-year-old victim also expressed her dissatisfaction in an open letter. “I was disgusted to hear the ruling of the Leuven court today. My now adult son is now being wronged for a second time. The first time by a pedophile rapist. The second time by the Belgian constitutional state. I have no understanding for this statement or for the so-called ‘extenuating circumstances’. I only see ‘aggravating circumstances’. I only feel powerlessness, anger and sadness,” she wrote.